Jan
Focus: offline, open source and chatgpt alternative. Shares local ai and llm with colibri. A desktop app, not an AI tool. Adds Windows, macOS and Linux. Rated 4.5 (colibri: 4.6).
Desktop AppFreeWindows, macOS
4.5Visit
AI Tool
colibri
Run huge open mixture-of-experts AI models on the computer you already own, no GPU required.
Rating
4.6 / 5
Pricing
Free
Difficulty
Advanced
Works on
Cross-Platform
Built with love by Shushant Lakhyani. Building bestproductivityresources.com
What is colibri?
colibri is a tiny inference engine, written in pure C with no dependencies, that runs very large open mixture-of-experts language models on ordinary hardware. It keeps the part of the model used for each token in memory and streams the rest, the experts, from disk when needed, so models with hundreds of billions of parameters can run without a GPU. It supports several open model families, including GLM, Kimi, DeepSeek, Qwen and MiMo, plus an image model. You need at least 8 GB of RAM, and more is better. It is free and open source under the Apache 2.0 licence.
Third-party open-source projects. We are not affiliated with their authors; repositories are provided as-is by their maintainers. Review each project's license, code and security before installing. See our Disclaimer.
Pros: what colibri does well
- Runs very large open models without a GPU
- Private: everything runs on your own machine
- Free and open source (Apache 2.0), hugely popular
Cons: where it falls short
- Streaming from disk is slower than running on a GPU
- Large model files need plenty of free disk space
Who colibri is for
Developers and tinkerers who want to run frontier-scale open models locally and privately.
Who can skip it
People happy using hosted AI chat apps.
colibri alternatives
Not sold on colibri? These do a similar job, and each card says what it has in common.
AnythingLLM Docs
Focus: anythingllm, documentation and guides. Shares local ai and llm with colibri. A website, not an AI tool. Adds Web. Rated 4.3 (colibri: 4.6).
WebsiteFreeWeb
4.3Visit
AnythingLLM Mobile
Focus: privacy, mobile and agent. Shares local ai and llm with colibri. A mobile app, not an AI tool. Adds iOS and Android. Rated 4.3 (colibri: 4.6).
Mobile AppFreeiOS, Android
4.3Visit
whisper.cpp
Focus: speech to text, transcription and open source. Shares local ai with colibri. Adds macOS, Windows and Linux. Rated 4.7 (colibri: 4.6).
AI ToolFreemacOS, Windows
4.7Visit
LibreChat
Focus: ai chat, self-hosted and open source. Shares llm with colibri. Adds Web. Same 4.6 rating.
AI ToolFreeWeb, Cross-Platform
4.6Visit
OpenSquilla
Focus: ai agent, token efficiency and cost optimization. Shares llm with colibri. Adds macOS, Windows and Linux. Same 4.6 rating.
AI ToolFreemacOS, Windows
4.6Visit
Free alternatives to colibri
Want to spend nothing? These free picks cover similar ground.
Vibe
Focus: transcription, speech to text and open source. Shares local ai with colibri. Adds macOS, Windows and Linux. Same 4.6 rating.
AI ToolFreemacOS, Windows
4.6Visit
DeepTeam
Focus: red teaming, security and ai agents. Shares llm with colibri. Rated 4.5 (colibri: 4.6).
AI ToolFreeCross-Platform
4.5Visit
deliberation
Focus: multi-model, deliberation and second opinion. Shares llm with colibri. Adds macOS, Windows and Linux. Rated 4.4 (colibri: 4.6).
AI ToolFreemacOS, Windows
4.4Visit
Gollem
Focus: golang, ai agents and mcp. Shares llm with colibri. Adds Web. Rated 4.4 (colibri: 4.6).
AI ToolFreeWeb
4.4Visit
Meetily
Focus: meeting notes, transcription and open source. Shares local ai with colibri. Adds macOS and Windows. Rated 4.4 (colibri: 4.6).
AI ToolFreemacOS, Windows
4.4Visit
MIRA OS
Focus: ai memory, long-term memory and ai companion. Shares llm with colibri. Rated 4.4 (colibri: 4.6).
AI ToolFreeCross-Platform
4.4Visit
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